I 'm going to show you when to use a past simple and when to use a present perfect,

and more important, how to keep them apart.

Take a look at these sentences :

I broke my leg on holiday last year.

I 've broken my leg.

The first sentence is in the past simple tense,

the second sentence is in the present perfect tense.

Now first we 're going to take a look at how to form a past simple

and how to form a present perfect.

For the regular verbs, we take the infinitive form of the verb and add " e d " to the past simple.

For example : I kicked the ball.

For the irregular verbs, we use the unique past simple form.

For instance : She bought a bike.

For the present perfect, we use the auxiliary verb to have and the past participle.

For the regular verbs, we make a past participle by adding " e d "

to the infinitive form of the verb.

For instance : I 've kicked the ball.

For the irregular verbs, the present perfect also uses a past participle

but this past participle has a unique past perfect form :

She has bought a bike.

Now, let's have a look at when we use a past simple.

We use a past simple when something happened at a specific time in the past :

I broke my leg last week.

So it's important that I tell you that it was " last week ".

For the present perfect, time is not important :

I 've broken my leg.

And it's not important when it happened.

We also use a present perfect for things that are started in the past,

but have continued in the present.

For example : I 've lived here since 2012.

In the past simple that would be : I lived there in 2012.